


the boy whose smile makes the sun look like a goth middle schooler that just discovered eyeliner

by Riley_Ludicrous



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Coming of Age, M/M, Mark Lee (NCT) is Whipped, Pre-Relationship, Pre-debut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-16
Updated: 2019-02-16
Packaged: 2019-10-29 22:25:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17816648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Riley_Ludicrous/pseuds/Riley_Ludicrous
Summary: Mark and Donghyuck through the years.(How Mark falls in love.)





	the boy whose smile makes the sun look like a goth middle schooler that just discovered eyeliner

Mark is new to Seoul and can barely speak the language let alone sing, but even still he resolves to realize his dream. Nothing will keep him from it, not the language barrier or the different education system or the dance practice or the voice practice with a boy who can hit much higher notes than he can.

(Actually, that last thing does have a bit of an effect on him, just not in the way of holding him back.)

He learns how to rap when his voice teacher hears him reciting poetry that was meant to be turned into a song, and he becomes good at it to the point where some higher up ducks his head in and whispers about a new boy group with more rapping than a majority of SM’s other groups. He pretends he can’t hear them whispering about him because one should never get their hopes too high up, but continue striving for greatness, he thinks.

The boy who can hit much higher notes than he can, Lee Donghyuck, does not share the sentiment to the same degree. He catches Mark when it’s just the two of them and tells him about the rumor floating around: “Mark Lee will be SM’s greatest rapper someday.” Mark is sure the other boy is just caught up in hyperbole, but if he is, the sentiment is sorely appreciated. It’s one thing to get whispered encouragement from your superiors, and it’s another to be blatantly complimented by one of his peers, someone suffering through this shindig with him.

If Mark Lee is destined to be SM’s greatest rapper, Lee Donghyuck will surely be recognized as a legendary vocal someday. Mark tries to tell Donghyuck this with his still not perfect Hangul, and Donghyuck shakes his head at Mark like he’s the one making things up. Nonetheless, Mark surmises, they’ll prove everyone wrong in the end, even themselves.

They become a bit of a duo, Mark and Donghyuck, even with the age gap and the latter’s quips and the former’s too-serious personality. They clash and bicker, and sometimes it’s mean and bitter, but they always return to each other at the end of the day. 

Mark is no cuddler, but Donghyuck definitely is. He’ll fight off Donghyuck’s advances in the daytime to the eyeballs of their elders, but when long, exhausting days are finally over, his tiny bunk is free reign for the younger. Donghyuck wraps himself around Mark so that the lack of space is hardly an issue, and then the morning alarm wakes them up, and they dive back into their lives.

They make a video together of a Bruno Mars song, and their superiors see it and commend them on their chemistry. “If this hints to what your stage presence will look like, we better debut the two of you,” their dance teacher teases them, and they get a rush of excitement. Mark tries not to think to hard about how much deeper the comment about chemistry runs true than anyone realizes.

They don’t debut together, the first time, and it’s scarier than Mark wants to admit to Donghyuck.

The other members of NCT U are familiar to him, of course. They’re all good hyungs to Mark, and Ten and Jaehyun and sometimes Taeyong spoke to him in English when he first arrived to calm his homesickness, and Taeyong gives his all in being as good of a leader as he can be, and Doyoung is a mother hen is there ever was one, and from his occasional interactions with Taeil who isn’t in Seventh Sense, but is in Without You, and who Donghyuck looks up to immensely, go well. He misses Donghyuck, though, and they all can’t replace his best friend.

His debut in 127 goes better in some ways, but it also means he has to share Donghyuck with the others, and he isn’t prepared for how odd he feels about that. The others give him knowing glances that he tries to ignore. He tries to ignore a number of things, like his weird hair coloring and how Donghyuck looks in red leather pants.

Donghyuck gives him a victorious look from the recording booth while he’s singing his bridge, as if to say, ‘Look, we made it!’ and Mark smiles at him. Jaehyun mutters something about “the Haechan heart eyes” when he catches Mark’s face.

There’s a no reprieve with Dream's debut because a cute Donghyuck is just as distracting as a hot Donghyuck, and really the two are one and the same. It’s still worlds better than debuting without him, so Mark doesn’t complain that much.

The Dreamies are less subtle than the hyungs in their observation tactics. Subtle looks are forgone for loudly mocking him when he gets the Haechan heart eyes, a term Jaehyun probably explained to them personally. 

After that there’s a bit of a blur of comebacks. With the Go comeback, Donghyuck gets his high notes, and he can’t decide whether he likes Go or Beautiful Time better because both put him in danger of breathlessness. 

(It’s easier to manage in Beautiful Time because he need that breath for dancing in Go.)

He keeps on falling for Donghyuck, and he thinks he knows that Donghyuck likes him back, and there is still bickering—the legendary 2017 summer fight that their fans caught on camera—but they mostly go on the way they always have.

Then Donghyuck breaks his shin, and Mark is a little wrecked. Donghyuck has always been there, was always supposed to be there, and Mark wants him here, or he wants to be there. He wants to reach through the phone screen whenever they call each other and comb his fingers through Donghyuck’s hair, give him every little piece of affection he ever wanted. He wants to cuddle with Donghyuck even though they haven’t shared a bed nearly as regularly as they did pre-debut. 

Donghyuck comes back and he can’t get up and dance with them yet, but he can still crawl into bed when Mark hesitantly asks and wrap himself around the other till the twin mattress feels spacious. Mark holds just as tightly, mindful of his leg, and whispers that he missed him. Donghyuck returns the sentiment softly.

Mark falls in love with a boy whose voice makes a siren sound like they smoked for sixty years and now have lung cancer. Mark falls in love with a boy whose smile makes the sun look like a goth middle schooler that just discovered eyeliner. Mark falls in love with Lee Donghyuck, and he tells him that in the dead of night.

Lee Donghyuck beams at him through the darkness, and he thinks he’ll be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> I needed to combat some writer's block with my chapter fic, so I thought to myself, "You know what I haven't done in a while? Markhyuck." and here we are. Don't worry, readers of "The Monster Under the Bed", I will soon have a chapter for you. Please leave comments and kudos! 
> 
> If you're wondering about Donghyuck in red leather pants, I present to you:  
> https://www.pinterest.com/pin/137289488658612968/


End file.
